


Spectacle

by LegolasLovely



Category: Being Human (UK), The Almighty Johnsons
Genre: Anders being an asshole with a sweet spot, Ice Skating, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:07:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28384509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LegolasLovely/pseuds/LegolasLovely
Relationships: Anders Johnson/John Mitchell
Comments: 5
Kudos: 8
Collections: GatheringFiKi - 12 Days Of Christmas 2020





	Spectacle

Anders had never given a single shit about ice skating. He didn’t pay attention to the Olympics or the Stanley Cup and he would have dunked himself head first into a frozen pond before he ever bought, or even worse, _rented_ used skates. No thanks. For most of his life, Anders thought freezing to death sounded much more entertaining than riding around in circles while dodging fallen children or broken ice.

He shared these exact opinions with one of his recent dates. Still, as he drove her to his apartment after their obligatory dinner, she pointed and pawed at his once pristinely cleaned passenger side window asking if they could go inside.

“It’ll be so _cozy_ and _warm_ and we can go _skating_ ,” she whined.

“I don’t skate.”

She walked two long fingers up his thigh from his knee. “Then we’ll go to the bar above the rink. We can drink hot toddies. And if you’re still feeling impatient, we can always go into the restroom. Together.”

Anders hummed. “What can we do in a restroom that we can’t do in my bed?”

“If you bring me to the rink,” she said, palming him and unbuttoning his pants, “I’ll suck you off here in the car _and_ in the restroom of the bar, all before we even get to your apartment. Deal?” she asked, already tonguing him exactly where he wanted her to.

“Deal,” he sighed, winding his fingers through her hair as he pulled into the rink’s parking lot.

*  
*  
*

With Anders looking forward to at least three orgasms that night and his date tasting hot toddies in the air, they settled at a high top table against the cool window that looked out onto the rink. To the woman’s dismay, there weren’t many skaters left for her entertainment, which left her begging for the umpteenth time for Anders to take her downstairs onto the ice.

But Anders wasn’t listening to her. It wasn’t the first time he hadn’t quite heard what she said, but it was the first time his mind didn’t stray to work or sex. Instead, his mind went to a warm, cushy blank as he watched one particular skater swirl around the ice.

“Uh, _hello_? Are you even listening to me?”

“No. I’m not.”

And with that, Anders graciously gave his date to a man who had been eye fucking her since she walked inside the bar. Without a wave or a glance or a worry, he slid down the stairs and through the stands to the edge of the rink. For hours, until the bar above closed, he watched the man skate.

That had been three weeks ago.

*  
*  
*

He’d left work early more than a few times since then. Most evenings, that same high top table was kept available for him. He’d order a strong drink, unbutton his jacket and sit, looming over the frosted ring until he spotted the skater he was looking for. From then on, though his thick thigh froze as it leaned into the glass and his clean shaven cheek felt frosty to the touch, his attention didn’t stray from the gliding figure that graced the ice.

Anders thought the man was a show off. He must have failed so miserably somewhere big, somewhere important, that he was forced to sail into this dinky, local rink with his tail between his legs, brandishing himself just to get his rocks off every night. Nice.

It was the only explanation Anders could come up with and he repeated the words to himself, the pity, while he watched those expensive skates leave perfect ringlets in the ice. Or sometimes, it was more like the path of a shooting star, straight and glowing until it rounded off as the rink arced like the curve of the earth.

As he watched, his glass never emptied. He was never asked if he wanted another drink, it just appeared.

In fact, most of the time he was left peacefully, blessedly alone. Still, at least once a week someone would come up to him, leaning on his table or his arm, working so hard to make him turn from the window.

“The rink is open to the public, you know. ‘Til eleven. We could rent some skates and-”

“I don’t skate.”

He never saw what they looked like and never saw them leave because he never took his eyes off the man below.

*  
*  
*

He rarely ventured down to the rink. When he did, he mostly kept to the shadows in the back row. It was there he grew familiar with the double and triple lutz, the camel spin, the arabesque, the scratch spin and all these bizarre names that he ended up googling when he couldn’t sleep at night and he’d already wrung himself dry.

It was there in the darkness, where the white reflection of the rink couldn’t reach him, that he was allowed to _listen_. Instead of the bar’s rumbling chatter or live jazz music, the ice lent its own symphony to his ears, with this familiar skater manipulating it as the first chair renders his own instrument.

The blades swished, the toes scratched, then a heavenly moment of blissful silence when the skates left the ice to meet and twirl in the air. It was all followed by a comforting, grounding crack. More swishing, more scratching.

What Anders focused on, however, was much more subtle. It was an instrument that others may not have even realized existed in the orchestra, but a vital one all the same. Anders listened hard for it.

Between the swishing and the scratching, just before the silence, was a breath- one that was labored, and yet free, comparable to the belly laugh of a man in his cups. He’d watch the leap or the lutz or whatever the fuck, and leave his ears open for the answering breath of relief and triumph.

Sometimes there were chuckles or grunts and other times only arduous breathing that accompanied the lasting tenutos of scraping blades on the smooth ice. Anders could imagine what else was in his repertoire, what the voice would sound like, what words would be said, what other soft, whining noises could be made with proper convincing. Still, in all the time Anders spent listening from the shadows, this only played a supporting role.

*  
*  
*

The man was a spectacle. Anders didn’t like spectacles. He didn’t spend his money on them, he didn’t appreciate them or support them, and most of the time, he thought things that were labored as spectacles were actually just dumb. And boring. But this man was a true spectacle.

He had an audience every night. Drunks at the bar above would press their noses to the glass and cheer him on while hockey moms would ignore their own children crashing flat on their faces in order to undress the bodacious skater with their own legs crossed tight under their knitted team blankets. It pissed Anders off. He didn’t like taking a back seat to such a deprived asshole.  
Eventually, however, the moms and the drunks would leave. All the other skaters would pack up their things and even the crew at the bar would dwindle down until the spectacle had an audience of one. And since Anders was the only member in the stands, he thought: Why not move to the front row, if only to see that tight ass better?

So he walked down the metal steps, clunking despite his light feet and even lighter custom tailored shoes, to find a dry, untouched place to sit up close.   
He heard the scratch of skates approach and looked up just in time to watch dirty, grated ice fly up from the rink and onto his sweater.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Anders asked the man just before him.

“I could ask you the same thing,” he answered, leaning on the rink’s wall. “You gonna get some skates or what?”

Anders watched him, made uncomfortable by the silence and by the skater’s closeness. Then he slid his tie from his neck and draped his wet sweater over the wall.

“Yeah. I am.”


End file.
